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One Wrong Takes It Light but Two Wrongs Makes It Right!

We’re going to show you all four hands from the start today which should help you with the problem for declarer, which suit to play at trick 3.

 

South opened their longest suit and North’s 2 showed 6-9 hcp with 4+ spades. Usually with 18 hcp, the opener would now jump directly to game. Although their partner may only have 6 hcps, most of the time 4 is the place South wants to be. However, North was good for their 2 bid (8 hcp and a singleton diamond) and so raised the 3 invite to game.

We do not recommend normally you lead a trump. Any other suit lead might work out better (here, a club or even maybe a heart). However, West led 2 with trick 1 being won by East’s ace. East found a very good switch for the defence, 3. South went up with their ace. What should they play to trick 3?

One slip…

Well, from the title to this article, you might guess that South got it wrong. They had been told, correctly…well, nearly correctly, that they should get rid of the opponents’ trumps as soon as they can, the only exception being if they needed to use dummy’s trumps for ruffing.

That was not the case here. So, South played J at trick 3. West won with the K and did really well to play Q which won the trick. Three tricks already for the defence and another heart would seal declarer’s fate: down one.

Two slips…

Alas, West decided it was time to switch to a diamond.

It is hard to keep track of every suit. West did not realise that their partner was likely now to hold K. (This is a case of West’s error but East’s fault! East held KJ and could/should have saved West from slipping up, by playing K on Q and then playJ. Nice thoughtful play had they found it.)

…. and game is made.

South struggled a little after winning the last diamond but drew trump and played KQ then A in that order before playing their top two diamonds, discarding a club and heart from dummy. They still had a trump in each hand and ruffed a heart and a club with them to come to 10 tricks.

Harder to visualise. It seems harder for players to realise that they sometimes need to play high cards from their hand to discard losing cards in dummy rather than the other way round. South’s mistake at trick 3 was that they had to play AKQ throwing away dummy’s two hearts. Had they done that, they would have made 11 tricks. They made 10 but after that trick 3 slip should have made 9.

In reality, only a club lead holds South to 10 tricks. West can score a club ruff after that lead. So, declarer’s slip should have seen the contract down 1 but West’s restored the result, just, to making 10 tricks.

Two wrongs: one right after all!

 

Richard Solomon

 

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